Meharry Medical College is a private historically black medical school affiliated with the United Methodist Church and located in Nashville, Tennessee. Founded in 1876 as the Medical Department of Central Tennessee College, it was the first medical school for African Americans in the South. While the majority of African Americans lived in the South, they were excluded from many public and private racially segregated institutions of higher education, particularly after the end of Reconstruction.

Meharry Medical College was chartered separately in 1915. In the early 21st century, it has become the largest private historically black institution in the United States solely dedicated to educating health care professionals and scientists. The school has never been segregated.

Meharry Medical College includes its School of Medicine, School of Dentistry, School of Graduate Studies, School of Applied Computational Sciences, School of Global Health, the Harold D. West Basic Sciences Center, and the Metropolitan General Hospital of Nashville-Davidson County. The degrees that Meharry offers include Doctor of Medicine (M.D.), Doctor of Dental Surgery (D.D.S.), Master of Science in Public Health (M.S.P.H.), Master of Health Science (M.H.S.), and Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) degrees. Meharry is the second-largest educator of African-American medical doctors and dentists in the United States. It has the highest percentage of African Americans graduating with Ph.Ds in the biomedical sciences in the country.

Journal of Health Care for the Poor and Underserved is a public health journal owned by and edited at Meharry Medical College. Around 76% of graduates of the school work as doctors treating people in underserved communities. School training emphasizes recognizing gaps in health caring to improve health outcomes for all, including populations.

Meharry Medical College was one of six medical institutions established between the years of 1876 and 1900 in the state of Tennessee. These schools were founded after the end of the Civil War when slaves had been freed. Because of their former restrictions, there were as yet few African-American physicians, and many freedmen in need of health care. Because of segregation, most hospitals would not admit African Americans, and many white physicians often chose not to serve freedmen. During the late 19th century and into the early 20th century, most medical institutions accepted few, if any, African-American students. To combat this shortage of health care and the lack of accessibility to medical education, individuals, such as Samuel Meharry, and organizations, such as the Medical Association of Colored Physicians, Surgeons, Dentists, and Pharmacists (later renamed the National Medical Association), helped to found medical schools specifically for African Americans.

The college was named for Samuel Meharry, a young Irish American immigrant who worked as a salt and grit trader on the Kentucky-Tennessee frontier. After achieving some success, he and four of his brothers later made a major donation to help establish the college. As a young trader, Meharry had been aided by a family of freedmen, whose names are unknown. Meharry reportedly told the formerly enslaved family, "I have no money, but when I can I shall do something for your race."

Students at Central Tennessee College (CTC) approached the college president about setting up a medical school in 1875. The president, John Braden, approached Samuel Meharry to discuss the proposal. In 1875, Meharry, together with four of his brothers, donated a total of $15,000 to assist with establishing a medical department at CTC, a historically black college in Nashville, Tennessee. With the contribution of the Freedman's Aid Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church North, George W. Hubbard and Braden, they opened the Medical College at CTC in 1876 with a starting class of nine students. The classes took place in the basement of the Clark Memorial Methodist Episcopal Church. The first regular year of classes began in October 1876 and had eleven students in that group. The medical program was initially two years long, but they added an additional year in 1879 and a fourth year to the course of study in 1893.

Hubbard, a physician, served as the founding president of the medical college. The first student graduated in 1877. The second class, which had its commencement in 1878, had three graduates.